


last night i dreamt (i died alone)

by Raycifer



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Grand Theft Auto Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, FakeHaus, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Pre-FakeHaus, Self-Destruction, Temporary Character Death, brief suicide mention, like literally a sentence - Freeform, the rest of the crew are in it but only for a little bit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 05:45:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7702873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raycifer/pseuds/Raycifer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"we felt our lips go numb; told ourselves the surgery of taking her out of our ribs made us more flexible, told ourselves that living without our bones just let us fit the shape they folded us into. when we woke up we still wanted her. like she was in our blood, our air, like we couldn’t escape her."</p><p>or: pre fakehaus immortal killemses</p>
            </blockquote>





	last night i dreamt (i died alone)

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by [this](http://inkskinned.com/post/148491386234/we-felt-our-lips-go-numb-told-ourselves-the) post on tumblr

In his dreams, she is always standing on the edge of the pier, long blond hair dancing in the wind behind her. She is facing the ocean, and all they can see are her red sneakers and oversized jacket and her petite frame. She never turns around. She takes a step forward, feet balancing on the edge like a tightrope, and they move towards her, in sync like they have been since they met. They don’t get to her in time. He reaches a hand out to her as she steps into thin air and plummets into the ocean. She doesn’t surface, and they crumble to the floor.

James wakes up after that. His chest is heaving and he isn’t sure if he’s even breathing, but he pushes himself out of his bed and pads towards the kitchen. Adam’s sitting there – beautiful, warm, Adam – with a mug of coffee in his hands and dark circles permanently stained under his eyes. He doesn’t sleep anymore. James almost wishes he didn’t sleep anymore either, not with the nightmares that plague his sleep every night. Still, he can’t seem to live off of adrenaline and caffeine like Adam, so he deals.

Adam gives James a soft smile as he passes him to pour himself coffee, and a silence falls over the room. It’s not quite peaceful; there is always an undertone of tension and grief that they haven’t been able to scrub clean. But they have each other, and they have to learn to learn how to live with a piece missing.

He grabs his coffee from the machine and wraps his hands around it, the heat burning his hands a little bit. He doesn’t really care about that. Helps him focus. He needs a little something to help him sort out the twisted labyrinth that is his mind, and so what if it’s not healthy? It’s not like he’s going to live forever. She proved that.

The coffee scalds his throat as he swallows it, but he welcomes the distraction. He can feel Adam’s concerned eyes on him, but that’s nothing new. Adam’s always concerned about him. It makes him feel so incredibly guilty sometimes; the way that he completely blocks Adam out whenever everything gets a little too much. He doesn’t deserve that. Then again, he didn’t deserve to get dragged into his mess in the first place, didn’t deserve to be truly happy in the first time in his life, only to have it ripped from his hands. James didn’t either. They deal.

Adam is so bright. He’s a little dulled around the edges, worn and torn but so utterly wonderful it takes James’ breath away. He remembers how he felt when he met her, and the feeling is duplicated when he looks into Adam’s brown eyes, the freckles splattered across his face and his half smile. He wishes he could hate him – maybe it would be easier. Because every time James looks at Adam, he sees her twirling in the streets, a blissful smile adorning her lips and adoring eyes glancing at James shyly. Then he sees the same eyes, this time not widened with mirth or love, but with fear. Hazel pools staring up at him blankly. Cold hands and pale lips. All his mistakes and failures raining down on him as he holds her in his arms.

So he does the best he can to erase her from his life. He scours his lips and his hands and every inch of him that she ever touched until he bleeds, and even then it is never enough. Somehow, by some sick miracle, she has been imprinted firmly into his very being. Her name is embroidered on his ribs, on the inside of his bottom lip, and he can’t escape her. He doesn’t want to.  Adam’s the same; when he did sleep, he murmured her name in his sleep like a prayer, over and over again like it would bring her back. It never did, and Adam stopped sleeping.

But, for now, they have a job to do. James puts his coffee mug in the sink and nods to Adam, leaving the room to have a shower and get dressed. Adam places his own mug with James’ (he tells himself he’ll clean it later, but in all likelihood it will still be there in a week’s time) and walks to the front room, his feet almost dragging on the carpet. He sits on the cracked couch that they keep meaning to replace and turns on the TV, some shitty rom com blaring. He leaves it on, because it was her favourite and it’s fun to roll his eyes at the overused clichés and soppy romances. He can hate these characters, these idealised romanticised depictions of love and no one can judge him for it.

The TV is still booming as James enters the room, fully dressed and with a small smile on his face as he looks at Adam.

“Again, with the rom coms Adam?”

“Look, okay, it’s not my fault they don’t put anything else on these bullshit channels. Blame the media, not me.”

It’s easy and comfortable and familiar as they look at each other, affection and amusement shining in James’ eyes as he perches on the arm of the couch next to Adam. Adam leans into his side and James slides his fingers through silky brown hair, humming an off key tune to himself as Adam closes his eyes for a brief moment. They’re okay. Fucked up and shattered, sure, but they’re okay. James drinks his coffee when it’s scalding hot and doesn’t drive safely anymore and Adam stands a little too close to explosions and forces himself to stay awake, but at least they have each other.

(Realistically, Adam knows they’re nowhere close too okay. They have been destroying themselves since the bank they were robbing went up in flames and she was still inside. It’s not healthy or normal but they can’t do anything else. They’re helpless, always, and so they deal with it.)

“Oh shit! James, we’re going to be late, you fucker!” Adam looks at his watch and bolts off the couch, grabbing his keys and shoving them in his pocket.

James laughs airily and strolls down the hall, putting his jacket on and opening the door for Adam. “Chill out man. The people who actually want to rob the store are probably the ones running late. We’re simply crashing the party.”

Adam rolls his eyes, trudging out of their shitty little apartment in favour for their even shittier car that he, for some reason, absolutely adores. James hates the thing, but he doesn’t buy a new one. Whatever makes him happy, he supposes.

For now, they’re racing down the motorway, Adam going way over the speed limit and the radio playing some beat-less pop song. In moments like these, James almost forgets about how wrong everything is without goofy jokes in the morning and gentle kisses on the cheek and blonde hair and sunlight beaming down on them. Adam’s hands are sturdy on the wheel as he drives, his sunglasses sliding down his nose as he looks out in the road in front of him. James remembers the first time he met Adam – a small smirk on his face as he shot the front man of some low down crew after he had tried to scam him. James had been nearby (he had heard about this petty crew through the grapevine, heard their boasts about how they had some of the best weapons in the city, and he wanted to see if it was true), and he recounts the way he gaped as Adam sent him a wink, before turning around and leaving.

The car stops outside an decent sized department store, snapping James out of his thoughts as Adam pats his shoulder, leaning out to exit the car. James grabs his gun from the side pocket, opening the door and sliding out. He looks at Adam, excitement coating his features, as Adam returns his gaze and shakes his head in fondness.

“Well, let’s go fuck up some poor asshole’s heist, shall we?” James says, twirling his gun around his fingers as Adam moves to his side.

“It is what we do best, after all.”

The ‘heist’ they’ve decided to screw up today belongs to some small, apparently unnamed crew which had been working its way up through the ranks as of late. James and Adam didn’t like that. They may be a two-man team, but they still had a fair bit of power (they had been around for far longer than any of these newbies). So, when one of their informers had told them that this crew had been planning to hit up a local department store, Adam had decided that it would be fun to knock these suckers down a few pegs,and James had agreed.

The heist is pretty disappointing, in all honesty. The crew is clearly pretty new at the whole killing thing, because they leave a few of the guards alive and their execution is sloppy at best. Adam takes the cctv cameras down and knocks the electricity out, while James keeps an eye on the crew and prepares himself to run in and grab the money bag at the feet of one of the guys. Looking at the crew, they really aren’t much. Five guys, all standing around and laughing as the frightened cashier hands them money. James feels a wave of sympathy for the cashier for a moment – they were obviously new if they appeared so scared – but he pushed it away in favour of staring at who was apparently the leader of this band of misfits. He was tall and well built, a beard covering half of his face and a youthful, happy glint in his eyes. Speaking of, half of the guys had beards. Adam would get along with them, he muses to himself.

The lights flickers for a second, before the room plunges into darkness. James almost laughs; Adam’s timing is impeccable,and he thinks of that old phrase ‘ _speak of the devil and he shall come_ ’. Ain’t that the truth.

James lunges forwards from his spot behind a rack of clothes to where the bag of money had been, confused yells and curses filling the air around him. His feet are light on the floor as he reaches the bag and picks it up, swinging it over his shoulder.

“You lot! Stop panicking and running around like headless chickens and do something. Joel, Lawrence go see what happened to the generator.” The leader speaks in a calm, smooth tone, and James cocks his head to the side as he looks at the shape of the man in the darkness. Huh. Maybe they weren’t as incompetent as he had originally thought.

It doesn’t matter at all though, as James makes his way out of the store and to the car. He slings the bag into the back as Adam greets him from the front seat. He jumps into his seat next to him, and as Adam was pulling out of the lot, the crew came running out. James turns around in his seat, a huge grin on his face as he waved at them.

“Thanks for the free money, boys!”

The crew shouts profanities at them as Adam drives off, James’ body shaking with laughter. He wipes a tear from the corner of his eye, taking a few breathes to calm himself. Adam is smiling too, although he had far more control than James, and he gives him a fond shake of his head while he drives. James’ arm is dangling out of the side window as they make their way home, the glory of their lifestyle filling them with momentary giddiness.

The giddiness fades as they pulled up next to their apartment, a soberer mood falling over the two as James grabs the bag and hauls it up to the front door. Adam lets them in, and James dumps the bag in the front room, throwing his jacket onto the coffee table and making his way to the kitchen to get two beers. He passes one to Adam, who’s already sitting down on the couch, and he sits next to him. The TV’s still playing – the same old rom com which they have seen a million times, and James is hit with a sudden pang of nostalgia for what once was.

They used to have this tradition after a heist, where James would go out to the nearest shop and buy the most expensive alcohol he could find, and he would bring it back and pour it into shitty glasses. The three of them would sit around the TV, an old black and white movie on as they laughed and drunk and let themselves be free from the stress and pain of their lifestyles.

They don’t watch black and white movies anymore.

Instead, they sit on the couch in their dreary front room, not talking to each other and watching whatever is on the channel on the TV. Occasionally, James will order Chinese takeout, which usually takes forty more minutes of silence before it arrives. Then, Adam will go up to the door and pay the delivery guy (“I swear to god if he asks for a bigger tip next time I’m just going to shoot him in the face,” he grumbles as he carries the food back to James). They eat in more silence, and one of them will break it every so often to make a snide comment about the programme they’re not really paying attention to, or to make a joke that quivers and falls short of what they had originally intended.

James goes to bed after finishing his meal, murmuring a good night to Adam and pressing a gentle kiss against his cheek as he stands up and walks slowly to his room. He pulls the covers over himself and closes his eyes, loneliness hitting him like a truck. He misses who he used to be. He misses the old Adam, the way which his eyes would light up in wonder and mischief, how soft and kind he used to be. He misses her most of all. She isn’t the sort of person you just move on from.

He falls asleep eventually, and Adam gets another cup of coffee and browses through his phone. The night outside is so quiet, devoid of the usual racket that filled the city. Almost as if there was some threat bigger and more dangerous than any of them. He turns the TV off, rubbing his brow as he sighs to himself.

Four in the morning is always the worst, in his opinion. The city stills for a moment, frozen in time, like some sort of twilight zone. It means he thinks, and that’s never a good thing.

Mostly, he wonders about who he could have been. His parents had had his life planned out for him; work his ass off, get into a top college, escape the endless cycle of poverty that he had been trapped in his entire life. Well, he certainly did that, but not in the most conventional way. He had flunked out of school the day his parents had both been shot in the head by some petty robber, eighteen years old and scared beyond belief. Some grunt work and nasty wounds later, he had the robber at gun point in a dirty ally. He hadn’t felt anything when he pulled the trigger.

In fact, he didn’t feel anything until a couple years later, when his arms deal when tits up and he killed a couple of low down assholes. He had been packing up when he had spotted a pair of baby blue eyes staring at him from one of the windows. The guy was clearly like him, and he was attractive as all hell, so he gave him a wink and a quick smirk and got the hell out of there.

He hadn’t expected to bump into him a few months later at some gala hosted by the Fake AH Crew. He was reluctant to go in the first place – the Fake’s were at the top for a reason, and he would rather shoot himself than just go into their arms without a weapon. Some gentle persuasion from the guy he had been working for convinced him (mostly, it was the words, “i _f you value your life and don’t want to end up in a ditch, go to the damned party_ ,” that convinced him). The gala was dull, full of phoneys and try hards, until he spotted a tall blond man with a petite, blonde haired woman hanging off his arm. It was the same guy he had seen during the shitty deal, of course, because the world loved to fuck with him apparently. The man comes over and introduces himself (“James,” he had said, his voice gentle and filled with amusement) and his wife. He didn’t want to remember that.

All he knows is that by the end of the night, he wanted more of the perfect blonde couple and their stupid beautiful smiles and god, he was so fucked. They made a good team as well, the best, and he joined them on so many heists, their heads thrown back in laughter and hands intertwined. That was all gone now though.

She had always been the backbone. The one who carried the other two through thick and thin. She was the one who was meant to grow old and have a life after she got tired of crime, a family. Adam would have sacrificed everything he was if it meant she could have a chance to actually live, and James would do exactly the same thing. But she never got to see what a normal lifestyle was like. No, she died, and Adam’s and James’ hearts collapsed into themselves and burnt with her. It didn’t matter how hard they tried to remove every trace of her; they could act like they were fine, as if they were simply moulding themselves into something more, something which could deal with loss and suffering and all the nasty, horrible shit in the universe. They would always be lying to themselves.

A sudden noise reverberates through the apartment, and it takes Adam a second to realise that it was a knock. A hesitant, reluctant knock on their front door at four in the morning. He grabs his gun from where he had discarded it on the coffee table, turning the safety off as he advances to the door. The hallway is an off white colour, and the wooden floor hasn’t been polished in so long because they were too busy to get it sorted. He couldn’t help but notice it as he made his way. There was so much evidence of their downfall, and now someone was at their door. Adam couldn’t help but wish the other person was holding a weapon too.

He takes a breath, before opening the door and pointing the gun straight at the person standing there. A person with blonde hair cascading down her back, wide hazel eyes and a small frame.

He drops the gun.

A couple of steps back, holding onto the wall as he gapes. It can’t be, she’s dead, he saw her burn. She’s dead, she’s been dead for a month, they mourned her and they ruined themselves and _holy fuck she cannot be standing at the door._

But she is, and he feels himself croaking out a yell for James as he tries to steady his breathing. James bursts out his room, his own gun in his hands, before he sees the figure at the door. His gun clatters to the ground, all the colour fading from his face as he just stares.

“No. No, no no no,” he points at her, grief and distress coating his features, “you’re dead, you burned, you can’t just- _Elyse_.” His voice is so desperate it hurts Adam, but he can’t tear his eyes from the woman who might be Elyse.

“I guess I have some explaining to do.”

It is her. Adam would recognise her voice anywhere, her tremulous, uncertain tone, and he lets a hitching breath that is too close to a sob out as he pulls her into his arms. She cries then, her body relaxing into his as he holds her so tightly, like if he let her go, even for a second, she would disappear into thin air. James walks over and joins them, peppering small kisses over Elyse’s face.

When they’ve all calmed down, they pull her into the front room and sit down on the coach. She explains to them what happened, how she had felt herself dying and how everything had gone black, only for her to wake up behind the wreck of the building she had burnt in. There were a couple of guys waiting for her, she says, and they told her how she was standing in front of them. Apparently they were the same as her.

Everything she was saying seemed so totally preposterous, so completely impossible, like a bad fantasy movie with shitty actors and even shittier special effects There had to be some reason that explained how she was here, with them, though. If this was it, then Adam couldn’t just brush it aside.

“So what,” he says after Elyse finishes explaining, “you’re some kind of immortal or something?”

“I’m not sure,” her voice is quiet and gentle, soothing the tension in the air.

“Whatever you are, you’re alive, and that’s all that matters,” he replies, smiling at her and taking a hold of one of her hands. She squeezes his hand, a soft smile on her face, before she looks at James and frowns.

James is staring at the floor, his hands in his lap as he turns his head on the side, before glancing at Elyse, and back to the ground again. He sighs, deep and haggard, putting his face in his hands before shaking his head and straightening up to look at his wife.“You’re not just a nightmare, right?”

“What?”

“Like, what if I wake up later and this has all been some sick dream,” he takes a worn breath, ripping his gaze from her again,“you’re still dead and we’re still falling apart and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“I’m real. I swear.”

He stands up with another sigh, running his hand through his hair. “I really hope you are. I’m just going to go back to sleep now, and I’ll see in the morning.” He tries to smile at Adam and Elyse, but it comes out strained and tired, and he finds himself practically bolting out of the room.

Elyse’s gaze is focused on the spot where James had sat, sadness coating her features, before she focused back on Adam. “Aren’t you going to sleep as well?”

Adam shakes his head, pulling his hand from hers and rubbing them together. “Nah. I stopped sleeping as much when… You know.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, looking away from Adam.

“It almost destroyed us.”

“I know.”

“James almost shot himself the week after, you know? I was lucky to get there in time to stop him.”

“I’m sorry.”

“We didn’t even have a body to bury.”

“I know.”

“I don’t think I could have survived losing both of you.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

The silence is heavy on both of their shoulders, unbridled fear pulsating throughout the air and clogging up their lungs. Adam takes a hold of Elyse’s small hand again, letting it warm him up and melt away the sorrow which had previously frozen his veins.

“I’m glad you’re back. We missed you.”

“So did I.”

James wakes up at nine in the morning, and he just lies in bed for a moment, letting the memories of what might have been a dream fill his mind. He can hear the sizzle of a fry pan in the kitchen, silvery giggles bubbling through their apartment and a gruff voice. His heart jumps into his throat then, and he throws his feet over the edge of the bed and tries not to run down the hall to the kitchen.

When he enters, the first thing he sees is Elyse. She’s sitting on the counter next to the stove, where Adam is cooking eggs and bacon and looking at her while they talk with the softest eyes. James makes a small noise at the back of his throat, because she’s real, she’s right here with them and he can’t believe this.

Elyse glances at him, and her eyes widen as a smile grows across her face. It starts uncertain, but as James lets his guard down and smiles back at her, it blossoms into pure joy and love. She jumps from the counter and practically flies into his arms, nearly knocking him over as he genuinely laughs for the first time in a month.

“Holy shit, you’re real,” he says, pulling back from their embrace to cup her face in both his hands, smoothing her hair from her forehead and kissing her temples and her nose and her cheeks.

“I’m real,” she smiles, and James puts his hands on her face again. Elyse places her hand over his, and they stay like that for what seems like forever.

They’re interrupted by a cough, and James looks up as Elyse turns her head to see Adam standing at the end of the kitchen, a smirk on his face as he waves to the food.

“Christ, I cook you two breakfast and you’re too busy being mushy and gross to appreciate it,” his voice is light, the lightest James has ever heard it and his heart is so full of love for these two beautiful stars.

James throws his head back and laughs, holding Elyse to his side as she laughs with him. Adam shakes his head at them, a smile engraved on his face as he dishes the food up and sets it onto the counter.

“I’m so unappreciated in this household,” he complains, giving James a mock glare, “truly. You two should apologise to me.”

“And how would we go about doing that?” James says, batting his eyelashes as Elyse pouts up at Adam. “You can have Elyse, if you want. She smells.”

“Hey!”

Adam chuckles, gazing at Elyse with vulnerability and affection shining in his eyes. “I mean, he’s not wrong love. You could use a shower.”

She scoffs, crossing her arms over her chest like a petulant child and stamping her foot on the ground. “You guys are the worst.”

“You know it,” Adam says as he steps forward to press a tender kiss to her forehead.

Elyse leaves the room, and he and James take their food to the front room, putting it on the coffee table and turning the TV on. They talk for a little while until Elyse joins them, grabbing her food and digging in. They both laugh at her, and everything is exactly like it was before.

Well, not exactly. Afterwards, James still drinks his coffee too hot, and Adam still forgets to sleep half the time, and Elyse wakes up screaming in the middle of the night sometimes, but they deal.

(And if another heist goes wrong and they find out that all of them are immortal, that’s their business. Theirs, and theirs alone.)

**Author's Note:**

> this was just a little idea i had after seeing the post i mentioned in the beginning notes by [inkskinned](http://inkskinned.com/) on tumblr that got kinda out of control as per usual.i'm trying to get used to writing fakehaus and funhaus in general, so yeah!  
> i'm also totally procrastinating writing how this world keeps spinning; the third chapter is done, but i'm not too sure what i'm going to write for the fourth chapter and i don't want to put the third out until it's done. writer's block is a pain in the ass, but i promise it'll be up by next week! (... probably.)


End file.
